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He was silent for a long time as he stared at his food. “Zach,” he finally said.
I still had half a sandwich and my soup left, but I lost all interest in the food and carefully eased the plate onto the coffee table, then settled my hand on Boo’s head so I’d have something to touch, since I doubted Jake would want me touching him at that moment. He seemed locked in place–like he wanted to run but couldn’t.
“How old is he?”
“Couple years younger than me.”
He still hadn’t looked at me.
“I have seven brothers and sisters,” I announced. He finally lifted his eyes. He too put his plate on the table, then settled back onto the couch. I figured I’d bought myself a momentary reprieve, but I’d have to tread carefully going forward. I nodded and said, “All younger than me.”
“Your parents wanted a big family, then?” Jake asked.
“More like it was a requirement in our religion,” I responded.
“Ah,” Jake said with a nod. “Did that make it hard for you when you were ready to come out?”
I shook my head slowly. “Nope. Didn’t have much of a say in it, actually.”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean, they walked in on me kissing a boy from church. They gave me a choice–them and the church or the streets. I’d seen enough to know what choosing the church would mean.”
“Conversion therapy,” Jake guessed.
I nodded as a shudder ran through my body. “I told them I figured God was okay with the way She made me and that was that.”
I’d meant my reference to God being female to lighten the mood, but Jake’s eyes went hard and dark, then softened before he reached out to take my fingers in his. “I’m sorry, Oz.”
“Don’t be,” I said. “It worked out.” Jake’s thumb began rubbing back and forth over the back of my hand. “What about you?” I asked carefully. “What was coming out like?”
“Scary as hell,” he admitted. A shot of happiness went through me when he shifted closer to me so that our legs were touching. He didn’t release my hand as he maneuvered the blankets so he was sitting beneath them as well. Our knees touched as he leaned back against the couch cushion.
“I grew up in a small town–kind of rural. Family values and church were a big thing, you know?”
I nodded. I definitely understood that.
“Growing up, I always wanted to be like my dad. He was a doctor too–family practice. Anyway, I kind of had a feeling my mom already knew because at some point she’d stopped mentioning things like girlfriend, and she’d be careful when she used certain pronouns. Like ‘them’ and ‘they’ instead of ‘her’ or ‘she.’ But my dad was a real man’s man–cars, sports, the works.”
“You didn’t want to disappoint him,” I ventured.
“Exactly.” Jake dropped his eyes to our joined hands. “All I’d ever wanted was to be exactly like him.”
“But you told them eventually.”
“I did. I waited until I was almost done with college, though. I guess it was kind of the coward’s way out.”
“What do you mean?” I asked.
“If they’d done what your parents did to you, I would have at least had something else to hang onto. I’d already been accepted to medical school, so…”
“I don’t think that’s cowardly at all. I think coming out is something that’s different for everyone. What happened when you told them?”
“They were amazing. Sure, they were confused and there was some adjusting to it all, but the very first words out of their mouths were that they loved me. They didn’t ask me if I was sure or suggest it was a phase. They hugged me and told me they loved me and nothing would change that. My brother and sister were cool with it too.”
“You have a sister too?” I asked.
“Yeah, Claire… she’s the baby of the family. She’d be twenty-five now.”
The way he said it was proof that it wasn’t just his mom he hadn’t seen in a long time. I wanted nothing more than to ask him what had happened that had kept him away from his family and made him hide the fact that he was a doctor, but I knew he wouldn’t tell me. I could see the tension running through his body even now. I still had a million questions I wanted to ask him, but there was really only one I needed the answer to at the moment.
I carefully eased Boo off my lap, then worked the mounds of blankets off our bodies and stood. “Jake, will you do something for me?”
He swallowed hard and hesitated, then finally nodded. I held out my hand to him.
“Come back to bed with me?”
Chapter 14
Jake
I woke up feeling hotter than I ever had in my entire life.
Which was saying a lot, considering some of the countries I’d traveled to as a doctor.
